“car”
And the following question is “Why?”.
Originally the F-150 was a perfect vehicle for most of non-urban America. It was very inexpensive (not a joke), simple to fix (also not a joke), dependable (I swear I’m not trolling), and very utilitarian. Eventually it became an icon and the default purchase for many, even though the more popular models have lost all of the features that made it attractive to begin with.
It also used to be a reasonable size. Larger than sedans, bit not by nearly as much.
Oh yeah, and not five foot tall at the hood by default.
I saw an OG F-100 truck the other day. The roof of its cab is about the same height as the hood of these new monsters.
Standard issue in the toxic masculinity starter pack.
Small peepee
I don’t think the article specifically addresses it, but I’d guess that their numbers account for fleet purchases, which are always going to skew the numbers a bit
There are many lists of “most popular vehicles” out there. The F-150 tops some of those lists and doesn’t even appear on others. There are a lot of games one can play with specificity to make something more prominent (“Ford F-series”) or less prominent (“Ram 1500 Rumble Bee”) in a list like that.
But the point – that we have more pickup trucks than can reasonably be justified – stands.
Everyone asking why and making jokes about masculinity are missing this point entirely. Ford is the most popular truck when it comes to fleets and actual work trucks, the kind you see with a flat bed or tons of built in metal tool boxes.
the kind you see with a flat bed or tons of built in metal tool boxes
Those are probably not 150s, though.
Good point, I missed that in the title. The fleet side of things still stands as far as I know. Though, the linked article linked doesn’t really mention any statistics on car sales.
My brief internet search shows it as the Ford F- Series, as of July of this year. https://www.caranddriver.com/news/g71006285/bestselling-cars-2026/
US auto makers failed at making 4 cylinder engines compared to Japan. So they consolidated around the v8 which they did really well. Everything else is a result of marketing and affordability over the years.
I don’t agree they failed - there are plenty 4 cylinder and hybrid cars available.
The thing is- people want trucks, and either they can afford them, or dealers and banks gaslight them to believe they can afford them. So that’s what people buy. I always find it funny when people explain the American auto market’s characteristics by shitting on how stupid American auto industry can’t even make cars. That is irrelevant, a bunch of people drive japanese or european cars if that’s what they want, it’s not like there aren’t imports available. People buy big ass trucks (including Toyota btw) because that’s what they want to drive. It’s that simple.
Manufacturers make what people want, for the most part.Not quite. There has been a systemic push to grow the size of US vehicles. Why can you not find ANY small trucks? It’s NOT because every American that wants a truck wants a big one.
This isn’t a conspiracy in the loonie sense. It’s completely true, though it was a conspiracy to manipulate the market, which succeeded. It started with the Chicken Tax.
Poorly executed vehicle efficiency requirements based on vehicle footprint ended up as a pressure for larger vehicles as well, which led to the rise in SUVs and oversized puckups.
I think you misunderstood what a light truck is . All pickups are in this category. A tariff on imports is hardly forcing American manufacturers and consumers to prefer bigger trucks and cars. They could just make them smaller if the smaller versions sold better.
The purpose of the tariff is:to give US domestic automakers an advantage over imported competitors
Look further into it. It’s extremely true that it was deliberate market manipulation. It started with the Chicken Tax. That was far, far from the only contributing factor.
Or manufacture desire, let’s not forget
I don’t understand how you think marketing explains consumer choice for trucks over cars. There’s no central advertising committee that bans the advertising of cars. There are in fact ads for cars and suvs as well. There is no concentrated marketing campaign against cars.
This is stricktly anecdotal but in my market it is clearly visible how car advertisement is heavily shifted towards SUVs. On television, magazines, etc. There is more publicity put towards SUVs.
There isn’t a central committee for advertising but it is easy to manufacture desire subtly. If a brand is well know for small hatchbacks but is aware the SUV segment is more popular or returns more profit, the advertisement can be engineered towards that particular segment in detriment of another.
Ok mr goal post mover. Is the big conspiracy to sell pickup trucks or to sell suvs? Or they haven’t decided yet?
is aware the SUV segment is more popular or returns more profit
That’s reaction to demand (my point) not manufacturing desire.
GM bought, built and jointly developed four cilinder engines in Europe for decades. They could just as simply brought home the technology and implement it.
From a long conversation I had with a few people that lived in the US for some decades, it’s about the perception of size and power. It’s about showing. There is a Camry where I live, gas engine; the car is a land yacht, the engine must be huge. For what? Next to the same car, a BMW is parked every day, smaller engine, much more power, a completely different level of manufacture.
The F150 is not a car, it’s a truck. For Americans, it’s a different category, for (many) Europeans, it’s a type of car.
And the dingleberry on top of the shit sundae is that Ford also killed off the EV version. Sure, the F-150 has a lot of problems simply based on its size. But, it is the most popular vehicle in the US and no amount of whining about it is going to change that fact. So, instead of pissing in the wind, the EV F-150 at least tried to meet people where they are. Unfortunately, sales weren’t great and Ford gave up on the project. The only upshot is that the venn diagram of diesel F-150 owners whining about gas prices and Trump voters is a small circle fully inside a larger circle. So, the right people are feeling pain.
Wait they’re no longer selling the F-150 Lightning? WTF, Ford?!
That’s some VW “Oh we didn’t make all the money instantly with BEV cars, so we’ll scale down our fleet and effort because of all the poor shareholders”-shortsightedness (which in VW’s case at least bit them in the arse properly, because right after they did that reversal BEVs got the upswing that everyone with 10+ braincells knew they’d get based on other countries, and now VW is falling behind)
Yup, it’s a dead duck.
Personally, I’m watching the Slate truck with some interest. As I would kinda like a better way to haul trash/yard debris; but, an F-150 (especially the newer, juiced up ones) seems like the type of overkill reserved for killing a fly with a tactical nuclear weapon. I’d be really happy to have one of the older ('90’s era) small trucks with an EV drive train. But those were killed by the rule of unintended consequences.You might also be interested in the Ford Fathom.
Ya actually, that is interesting. Thank for the link.
The test platform spottings in the wild put it at Maverick size.
Digging around, that seems to be [just a bit bigger[(https://www.blueovaltrucks.com/ford-maverick-and-old-school-ford-ranger-comparison/) than the old rangers used to be (before Ford supersized them). So, might be a reasonable size for a light truck.
As I understand it, the F-150 Lightning was the rare beast that was overengineered in the best way. Ford killed it because they figured out that they made more money making batteries for the grid, so they retooled the facilities for that.
If you bought a Lightning, don’t sell it.
I wonder if people will start to use AI to replace the code once Ford drops support.
I would have loved one of the EV F150s, but I’m poor
I’m not poor and never would buy one at the current generation, was hoping for them to improve it a bit but here we are
25 “Flash” trim (mid tier) here. They took some features away in 2024 (80A charging/V2L) but switched to a heat pump making it more winter efficient. And ditched the phone as a key, which is the only thing I really wish they kept.
Best vehicle I’ve owned. And huge space in the back for car seats and crap.
Wish they kept making them, maybe in the future
By the time I was considering an AWD one as a sled carrier, they discontinued it. Now I’m looking at old Tundras and Titans.
Ford isn’t giving up on electric trucks. It expects to sell the EV Fathom for less than $30,000 next year, and that EV platform is intended to be the foundation of a wide variety of models, with lessons learned from the F-150 Lightning and the Mustang Mach E. One big one they’ve talked about is the advantages of designing an EV from the ground up with no intention of sharing a platform with an ICE powertrain, and minimizing weight from wiring and harnesses following inefficient paths.
TIL: about the Fathom. Thanks.
Just make sure your schadenfreude doesn’t evolve into stooping to their level. That’s how we’ve ended up circling the drain even in an age of technological boom.
Now I’m stuck trying to figure out what the EV equivalent of “rolling coal” would be.
Tesla roadster blasting 10000psi of compressed air and road debris on anyone around them to hop over a speed bump
Continuing to drive our vehicles for 7 cents per mile.
It is interesting seeing Americans always complaining about gas prices(especially now) whilst also owning vehicles that use up fuel by just looking at them.
Its interesting people outside the US assume in a country of 300 million people that the same people buying trucks are the same people complaining about gas.
First figure I found was 725,000ish F150s sold in 2022. That only leaves 299,275,000 other people that must not complain about gas if all the complaining is done by the f150 owners.
My money is on the sales being boosted by fleet purchases of F-150’s cuz its tough to find a public works department in any village, town, subarb or even city that doesnt bulk purchase Ford trucks.
The two things you need to understand about America(ns)…. American is spread out. Like seriously large and open. This has lead to a lot of “super-sizing” in general. Not just their guts. Houses, cars, etc.
The second aspect is people buy for the “5% chance”, not their 95% daily habits. What I mean by this is they might have to haul something once a year, or they might end up having to take a long road trip. Rather than renting for that one day, for that one specific purpose they want something that can do it all (incidentally this is also why EVs have had a tough time catching on).
Those two points make the F150 perfectly slotted to be the most popular “car”.
No, it’s because the US government works for corporations and always has.
Trucks have gotten bigger because of a concerted effort to manipulate the market by automakers for over 50 years. It started with the Chicken Tax.
Not everyone that wants a truck is dumb enough to want a big one, even in the US.
I don’t buy the America-big explanation. For that matter, so is Russia. The original colonies weren’t that big, just the Western states with hardly anybody in them. And this culture is on display even in geographically-constrained areas, like Manhattan, Los Angeles, Hawaii, and the like.
The classics of racism and toxic individualism provide better explanations.
I see it this way: Yes, a lot of our local rural and suburban infrastructure is spread-out and car-centric, but that was a result of our choices and policies. (Which does indeed include a big helping of cloaked racial segregation.) It’s not the case that we were forced by geography to do this to ourselves.
“America is just so spread out” can be read as “We just didn’t plan this too well.”
wtf does racism have to do with car buying?
the russian auto industry is tiny compared to the major automotive market players.
The US Supreme Court ruled racial discrimination in zoning to be un-Constitutional in 1917, and barred racially-restrictive covenants in 1948, so local governments and planners had to use various proxies for race to keep Black people out of new neighborhoods post-WWII. Since Black people tended to be economically disadvantaged, wealth was a very useful proxy. They made housing expensive using zoning and building codes to ensure that it was low-density, and required the purchase of a car to access. I keep pushing the book The Color of Law by Richard Rothstein, because he laid out in it exactly how deliberate this was.
Later, the physical isolation of an automobile provided a measure of protection for Black families to exist in public spaces, and publications like the Green Book allowed them some of the same freedoms as white people, through the use of their cars. So, in at least two ways, racism pushed people into cars.
I second toxic individualism.
It remains me of Rome just before collapse.
The second aspect is people buy for the “5% chance”, not their 95% daily habits.
me with my roofbox I’ve used once. tho it’s nice that it’s an optional attachment to my wagon that I don’t need installed 24/7, and thank fuck for that cuz the wagon it gets attached to is an EV where the aero drag does matter a bit more than in an ICE powered vehicle
Rather than renting for that one day, for that one specific purpose they want something that can do it all (incidentally this is also why EVs have had a tough time catching on).
Taycan wagon does it all for me! Highly recommend anyone who’s curious about one and can afford a certified used one to definitely consider it! Take advantage of their crazy depreciation!
Tons of space, enough battery capacity given the excellent DC charging speeds, very fun, very comfy, very very pretty
Isn’t this has been #1 for like 25 or 30 years, except one year it was the Camry or something?
yes
it has massive sales because it has such broad appeal and a huge number of configurable options.
This really shows you the state of the average person in the US.
It’s not a car, the things are the size of a semi cab. I needed an electric truck and mine is huge too. It’s annoying, it doesn’t fit anywhere and it’s fucking dangerous to pedestrians. Make Trucks Small Again.
I think they will based off the success of the Ford Maverick.
Part of it is the sheer diversity of options and trim levels that are all under the same make and model of the Ford F-150. Taking a look at the Ford F-150 trim levels, there are basically 4 gasoline engines, 2 flex fuel engines, 1 hybrid drivetrain, 1 diesel engine, and a now discontinued EV powertrain. There are about 5 body/cab options, and several suspension options.
In contrast, take, for example, the GM BEV3 platform. It’s the Chevy Equinox, Chevy Blazer, Cadillac Lyriq, Cadillac Optiq, Honda Prologue, and Acura ZDX. I’ve driven several of these and they’re all basically the same with different options. There’s less diversity in those models than there is for the Ford F-150.
Small dick energy is strong with this one
Piggybacking off the point some people made about fleet purchases of trucks boosting sales, even with that in mind, out of the top ten vehicles sold its split down the middle with 5 being trucks and only 1 that isnt a fleet targeted truck (the Tacoma being the one truck you dont see many fleets of in the US) and the other 5 are all gas saving sedans, wagon/mini suv like rav4, and 2 electric vehicles. You knock out fleet sales of trucks and id b3 willing to bet that top 10 list jumps to 8 gas conserving whips to 1 maybe 2 pickup trucks.
RAV4 would be considered on the bigger side here and i wouldn’t be surprised if the US model is bigger.
I’m curious why they dont use the Tacoma more. Cheapest Tacoma is 10 grand cheaper that the cheapest f150.
I would assume they cut deals on bulk purchases and those contracts are competed for. Probably made the decision to cut even deeper and count it as marketing spend to have all those on the road.
cause they don’t allow cooler cars in the US anymore
Can confirm. The idiots in my state don’t even allow kei trucks on the road. Farmers still import them for getting actual work done on their own land, though.
that’s the particular model I had in mind too; it’s such a shame how corporations completely run the show here
People don’t realize how much of that is due to fleet sales.
It depends on where you live
Is it still true that even Rhode Island has/had more truck sales than car sales?
Non-truck/SUV cars only make up 20% of new car sales now, and it’s been less than 50% for more than a decade. The last time cars were popular was the 2000s, after 2008 economic crisis their sales rapidly decreased.
in another 10 years sedans will be effectively be extinct and everything will be a SUV or a truck. they drop a few percentage points every year.
Fuckin rednecks
Fleet sales are a huge factor.
Fuckin fleets of rednecks
